Captain Credible

If computers did try to take over the world, one man who couldn’t stop them is gravel-throat John Connor --that charmless ass kicking is not the way to get it done. Technology is our friend...John, stop blowing up computers! Well, who could placate a furious horde of machines? Apple are almost as ubiquitous as Skynet, so maybe Stephen Jobs, but it might end like Franz “The Flying Tailor” Reichelt who jumped from the Eiffel Tower in his very own “parachute” invention, disrupted his bowels in bespoke tailoring and then promptly hit the ground. Dead. We need a softer touch to have our machines wagging their tails in delight, squealing in digital rapture, and cooing binary. We need Captain Credible.

The English born, Norwegian based artist has a bevy of handcrafted noise machines, which he commands into a bombastic 8-bit sound that is noise and chiptune at its weirdest and most furious. Although, Jessica Rylan has created her own batch of synths that share some similar mechanics, what she has used to make an intimate, conversational music; Captain Credible has made into something more akin to DJ Scotch Egg than Can’t. His home-spun future-shock is filled with absurdities, lyrics about zombie aliens, cakes, and elephants. It twitches and eeks and jumps down your earholes like some post cyber bacteria of videogame-gabba.

The Captain’s “robots’’ can be got on his website, their retrofuturistic design combines painted recycled elements with contemporary electronics. The Flaming Robox is part recycled lighter fluid tin, part self oscillating noise generator --according to the Captain its equipped with “a control for the frequency of sillyness.” Ace! So what else is in his troop? The Epileptic Bird Synth which has a wee Bluebird on it and has some hand knitted wiring --ahhwww. Then it gets turned on and jitters like Woody Allen and Ray Cummings trying out their A game after espresso two pinters.

Captain Credible's latest invention is a Programmable Midi Kalimba which was created with a vinyl, a drum-stick, a midi-controller, a hairclip plus a Captain Credible sticker. It has exicited me so much i might just start Instrument of the Week on Dead Brain.

Behold the website from the man who created Darth Fader.

If your geek is still not satisfied, get tuned to ASCII --the first ever videogames based radio show in the UK-- that’s been broadcasting chiptune and videogame remixes since 2005 from the Subcity studio. Hosted by gamers Tim and Euan , the music is as varied as the videogames discussed. Expect a core of chiptune both original and remixed with a healthy amount of gabba, jpop, original soundtracks and intense Mario Kart battles. Get there up holding L1, R2, X, X, Y then press start. Or for a heavy dose of dystopia in picutres/words format you could read/re-read the darkly hilarious and quite wonderful Transmetropolitan by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson.